Streamline the ordering process

[Khorm]

Here's my idea:

Remove the role that the request tool plays in orders completely.

Do this by having NPCs be able to take orders from players. Say I'm working for House Bologna and Freddy wants to order a full suit of bologna-flavored armor and a dill spear. Aforementioned NPC has a list of items that he/she/it will take orders for, a list of times each item takes to process, and a "house cost" he will take in exchange for the order. My character approaches the NPC and "order bologna-flavored boots, leggings, etc", NPC says "That's x dollars and y time for each item ordered". Maybe he even gives me a ticket like those fine ladies and gentlemen in charge of tailoring. Now maybe a dill spear includes a special sauce that needs to be hunted down, so the time is a higher integer.

Obviously I think this is an awesome idea or I wouldn't be posting it here. I think if something like this were coded it would do things like free up staff time that would otherwise be spent on tracking down items in the database and loading them on NPCs, make the entire processing time of orders streamlined, and make policies like "cash up front" the norm. I think it could also cut down on a lot of the frustration and guesswork associated with players asking "how much and how long?"

It could be a pain in the ass to code, but I'm pretty ignorant of all that.

Thoughts?

[maxid]

This would massively streamline things, and also make it a lot easier for the staff working in those clans.  It's one of the best ideas for the game I've heard of in recent time.  I don't know if the NPC code could do it, but I think it could, seeing as it could work similarly to a tailor, in that you get a ticket and it makes you wait until X game day/time to turn it in, or whatever.

[Yam]

1) There are thousands of items available from House Kadius alone. This could probably be overcome by having multiple merchants but this would take a great deal of effort.

But

2) Staff act as a medium to cull what would be available to certain social tiers and houses. Also what is loaded based on available materials. If Kadius is out of emeralds, for instance, staff wont let you load emeral-adorned gear without securing a new supply. This wouldn't be feasible to code into NPC vendors, though it might be doable with a lot of effort.

3) There some wonder and exclusivity for orderable items. A lot of that would be lost if an House merchant could just look through the entire list. Getting the most desirable items is usually a matter of accrued experience (and House favor) on the part of the merchant and establishing a positive relationship on the part of the buyer.

[Khorm]

1) There are thousands of items available from House Kadius alone. This could probably be overcome by having multiple merchants but this would take a great deal of effort.

But

2) Staff act as a medium to cull what would be available to certain social tiers and houses. Also what is loaded based on available materials. If Kadius is out of emeralds, for instance, staff wont let you load emeral-adorned gear without securing a new supply. This wouldn't be feasible to code into NPC vendors, though it might be doable with a lot of effort.

3) There some wonder and exclusivity for orderable items. A lot of that would be lost if an House merchant could just look through the entire list. Getting the most desirable items is usually a matter of accrued experience (and House favor) on the part of the merchant and establishing a positive relationship on the part of the buyer.

In the case of items that have component requirements, why not have the NPC require something like an emerald in addition to coins? Someone has to provide an emerald? Provide an emerald.

As far as lists are concerned.. nowhere in my post did I mention a list. Approaching an NPC and entering the syntax >order dill.spear doesn't require a list of absolutely everything that any given House produces. Say I try and >order hamburger.pilates, and House Bologna doesn't offer ground beef workouts.. they dude just says "we don't sell that sodomite trash."

[Yam]

Going to be mighty hard to order anything unless you know specific keywords then.

[maxid]

1) There are thousands of items available from House Kadius alone. This could probably be overcome by having multiple merchants but this would take a great deal of effort.

But

2) Staff act as a medium to cull what would be available to certain social tiers and houses. Also what is loaded based on available materials. If Kadius is out of emeralds, for instance, staff wont let you load emeral-adorned gear without securing a new supply. This wouldn't be feasible to code into NPC vendors, though it might be doable with a lot of effort.

3) There some wonder and exclusivity for orderable items. A lot of that would be lost if an House merchant could just look through the entire list. Getting the most desirable items is usually a matter of accrued experience (and House favor) on the part of the merchant and establishing a positive relationship on the part of the buyer.

So it's an OOC barrier.  Those damn newbies haven't put in the TIME and EFFORT to be able to order the special fingerless fighting gloves!  Only I, who have spent years in this game, and learned once on a past character that House X sells these mighty weapons, will be able to order them!

Your main gripe seems to be the effort, which is actually a somewhat valid gripe. However, it might pique the interest of a coder who feels like doing it.  It's not -really- your call to tell us, or them, that it's too much effort.  Just like it isn't my call, or the other guy's call, to tell them they NEED TO DO THIS OMG.  It's just a neat, potentially useful idea.  This could ALSO just be used for everyday items which are ordered literally all the time, but often run out of stock at specific House merchants due to the way things are handled now, reserving the rarer OOC-knowledge-required items for those who have played for years, so that they can still feel special.

[Khorm]

Chock it up to accrued experience. At this point I'm still going to have to submit a question request if I'm unsure whether something is sold. I don't see this idea as one to change that. Rather a tool to more efficiently conduct business.

[Yam]

1) There are thousands of items available from House Kadius alone. This could probably be overcome by having multiple merchants but this would take a great deal of effort.

But

2) Staff act as a medium to cull what would be available to certain social tiers and houses. Also what is loaded based on available materials. If Kadius is out of emeralds, for instance, staff wont let you load emeral-adorned gear without securing a new supply. This wouldn't be feasible to code into NPC vendors, though it might be doable with a lot of effort.

3) There some wonder and exclusivity for orderable items. A lot of that would be lost if an House merchant could just look through the entire list. Getting the most desirable items is usually a matter of accrued experience (and House favor) on the part of the merchant and establishing a positive relationship on the part of the buyer.

So it's an OOC barrier.  Those damn newbies haven't put in the TIME and EFFORT to be able to order the special fingerless fighting gloves!  Only I, who have spent years in this game, and learned once on a past character that House X sells these mighty weapons, will be able to order them!

The fighting gloves are all gone, man. They're all gone.

[maxid]

The fighting gloves are all gone, man. They're all gone.

They are, but my point still stands, it was safer to use something that is no longer a real item for fear of allowing someone who hasn't put in the TIME MAN to FIND OUT IC!!!!! to learn about one of the TOP SECRET CONFIDENTIAL items that can be ordered.

[Yam]

Yeah, pretty much. The Great Merchant Houses aren't Sears Roebuck.

[maxid]

Yeah, pretty much. The Great Merchant Houses aren't Sears Roebuck.

I don't get this post, as it doesn't address anything that's been said - and you've conveniently ignored anything that could actually make you see the point being made so that you can quip and feel smugly secure in your OOC knowledge trumping other people's to give you an IC advantage when you play a role.  So.  Cool. 

[Eurynomos]

I personally don't find item orders taxing on my time, and I think coding a system like this would not be the greatest utilization of our coders' time.

[Yam]

Relax maxid, it'll be okay.

I had my only merchant role where I didn't really know squat about the House's items.

The process of ordering is thus:

1) Collect orders from people. They can either give you descriptions of key words what I want.
   - Burpy Fale wants some type of dagger good for holding poison
   - Fuckhead Borsail wants an obsidian, wyvern-etched breastplate

2) Send in a request relaying the orders.

3) Receive a response of things that are loaded up. Sometimes staff will load up several things that match a customer's description. Or they'll give you a list and say to pick. If the materials are not available or there is some other problem, staff will let you know.

4) Buy the items off an NPC.

5) Mark up. Sell to end customer.

I found this to be a pretty convenient system and it's also the one staff evidently prefers.

http://www.zalanthas.org/gdb/index.php/topic,3920.0.html
http://www.zalanthas.org/gdb/index.php/topic,27280.0.html
http://www.zalanthas.org/gdb/index.php/topic,27280.0.html

Handling the entire thing via a regular merchant NPC or an NPC like Ariada would be more complicated. I outlined why for a regular merchant NPC.

An Ariada-like NPC is, from my understand, pretty hard to code. Even for just a portion of a GMH database. Tickets are also confusing as fuck - as far as I know there's no way to have one NPC give you different tickets for different objects. You could put in a workaround for special materials like the guy who gets silt horror-shells. But that's really all clunky as fuck and easily broken. I also don't think it can all be applied to the same NPC.

But really the request system isn't broken. It works fine.

[Nyr]

All I can offer is that this is something that has come up on the staff side before; we have some ideas that have been discussed to an extent such that if such a system were implemented, we have a certain route we'd want to go.  There are other things that are higher priority right now, however.

[Welda]

Another problem is that PC usually don't provide the exact sdesc of the item. Most of orders are vague: "I want something green to go with my brown skirt, not silk, but still something fancy." or "There was this hat, I think it was brown... or maybe black... or pink? Either way, it was cool and I want it."

[valeria]

Most PCs don't know exactly what they're looking for in the wide world of available items.  One of my toughest experiences was as a relatively new player playing a merchant house family member, because I never knew what I was asking for.

However, I would never want to relegate the ordering process to an NPC entirely.  We have shops that do that.  Many of the shops in this game even rotate selections, which is a feature I personally love.

Interacting with a merchant house employee is more of a personalized experience and when I was playing a merchant I loved the opportunity to interact with characters about orders.  The only thing I didn't love was when customers would treat my character like a shop NPC... limited interaction, 'this exactly sdesc is what I want and no I will not talk to you about accessories or anything because I am Busy and I want it right now because I have this thing coming up I didn't adequately plan for in advance' etc.  Fortunately most players didn't do that.

[maxid]

All I can offer is that this is something that has come up on the staff side before; we have some ideas that have been discussed to an extent such that if such a system were implemented, we have a certain route we'd want to go.  There are other things that are higher priority right now, however.

Cool thanks.  I didn't figure it'd be very high priority, but I'm glad it's been considered at least, I'm sure it can sometimes be a ridiculous hassle for staff when people do as Welda said and use imprecise language in order to try and get something.  I just really liked the idea after a recent merchant PC where I felt in the dark about what I had to offer a lot of the time.

Relax maxid, it'll be okay.

DERP ORDER SYSTEM THAT WE'VE BEEN DISCUSSING AT LENGTH REEXPLAINED FOR NO REASON.

Yes I am aware of how the ordering system works, that should be evident as I'm discussing the ordering system, and ways to streamline it.  And I'm not upset in the slightest, just poking fun at your STATUS QUO FOREVER attitude.  I realize you've put in your time to gain your OOC advantage (Heck, I've been here about a decade or so, so I have too) but I dislike that aspect of the game, and the GDB culture surrounding it.  It is offputting to new players, and it stifles innovation that could keep this, already niche as fuck, game alive longer.  Sorry that this is such a difficult concept for you, but OOC knowledge should impact the IC of the game as little as possible.  This is a bit of a novel concept in a Rp game, I admit, but it just might work out if you gave it a try.

[Yam]

No really maxid stop being a jerk we used to play League of Legends together. We used to be friends.

Relax maxid, it'll be okay.

DERP ORDER SYSTEM THAT WE'VE BEEN DISCUSSING AT LENGTH REEXPLAINED FOR NO REASON.

Yes I am aware of how the ordering system works, that should be evident as I'm discussing the ordering system, and ways to streamline it.  And I'm not upset in the slightest, just poking fun at your STATUS QUO FOREVER attitude.  I realize you've put in your time to gain your OOC advantage (Heck, I've been here about a decade or so, so I have too) but I dislike that aspect of the game, and the GDB culture surrounding it.  It is offputting to new players, and it stifles innovation that could keep this, already niche as fuck, game alive longer.  Sorry that this is such a difficult concept for you, but OOC knowledge should impact the IC of the game as little as possible.  This is a bit of a novel concept in a Rp game, I admit, but it just might work out if you gave it a try.

It didn't sound like you knew how the ordering system worked. I put it up to illustrate how simple the process is on the player end and how you don't need specific keywords to order items. You can even ask about what's available if you don't know. I also thought the current ordering system was being misrepresented as overcomplicated and based on knowing secret item keywords. Which it isn't.

When I'm talking about experience with ordering, I'm talking about IC experience, not OOC experience. I came into a merchant role with very little knowledge about what the particular house sold. He learned a lot about what the House sold in game by talking to his crafters, looking at fashionable people, and so on. I also asked about things in my and ordered certain show items in my weekly reports.

ICly, I don't think every starting merchant should be intimately familiar with all the thousand or however many items you can order from a House. Working to learn more of your house's inventory is part of the job. I don't know what the OOC advantage here is. Hypothetically, if I knew of some rare, powerful, and desirous item that nobody else knew about, the cat'd be out of the bag as soon as it was out in the public. If I ordered up a whole bunch and sold a whole bunch right at once, I'd probably be reprimanded for diluting part of the House's exclusive image.

What exactly are you talking about when you mean OOC advantage with item ordering and what kind of automated system would prevent that?

A workable system might give each House a couple of merchants with rotating stock. Kadius might have a merchant for upcoming season promotional clothing and accessories. Salarr might have a material overage guy that sold mekillot bone weapons and mekillot hide armor if mekillots were plentiful, kryl for kryl, etc. Kurac could have a spice and gear surplus merchant. If they all rotated in the same way the Kadian shops did, that would give new merchants a good base idea of what they have to offer.

A ticket system could work for specific sets, like Salarr's horror-shell or Kurac's camouflage.  Kadius has some sets too, but its item list is huge and crazy compared to the other two.

I'm still not sure if that could be coded to take materials into account. I've only ever seen the take-material-sell-thing script on one regular merchant NPC. Tickets are also much harder for me to keep track of than request tool orders.

[Delirium]

I played a Kadian once. I religiously checked the shops and the storerooms and took note of what was available in there.

Within a few months I had an extensive knowledge of what was available, despite having very little previous knowledge. I could apply that knowledge to put together items that would work together well as 'outfits' and paid attention to the difference between southern and northern fashion. I made a total killing off fashion-hungry nobles.

Hike up them boots and put in a little elbow grease, cowboys. It really wasn't that hard.

[maxid]

I played a Kadian once. I religiously checked the shops and the storerooms and took note of what was available in there.

Within a few months I had an extensive knowledge of what was available, despite having very little previous knowledge. I could apply that knowledge to put together items that would work together well as 'outfits' and paid attention to the difference between southern and northern fashion. I made a total killing off fashion-hungry nobles.

Hike up them boots and put in a little elbow grease, cowboys. It really wasn't that hard.

Thank you for illustrating the OOC knowledge that will aid you next time you create a Kadian, that a newbie will not be able to benefit from.  The next time you play a Kadian you won't need to spend a few months before you're able to make insane amounts of coin, which will allow you to have a massive advantage over a newbie hired at the same/a similar time.  I understand you don't see the issue, as you've put in your time, but it is a barrier that you can now now avoid, and that gives you a rather large (several months worth of effort worth!) leg up.  I believe a better system to help even that out, and make it a little easier for new people/people who may not have the free time others do to engage in merchanting a vast amount of goods.


Yam: Those are all potentially helpful or workable systems, I don't know why you magically assumed I had no knowledge of the ordering process.. when we'd been discussing it and ways to improve upon it for the entire thread.  In any case, I realize tickets aren't ideal, especially since they all look the same most of the time (though they could have a desc to describe what they are - a black leather ticket, l ticket, This is a black leather ticket with a suit of silt horror armor stamped into it.)  The rotating stock thing would be neat as well, and allow for people to learn things by visiting as Delirium did, though it would still take months and massively benefit older players over newer ones.


The argument that 'letting people know the full stock would lead to everyone selling the rarest shit all the time' is fallacious, as there are a lot of things that a player OOCly knows that they may not apply IC at any given time.  I wouldn't have my 13 year old atrium trained wanna-be eventual noble's aide know how poisons and cures work, despite knowing it OOCly, I'd learn it IC.  This may seem, at first, to say that people who know that House Kurac can sell fingerless gloves can pretend they don't know, but there are a dozen easy ways to learn how cures work, and it's, at most, an hour long lesson, while learning the full stock of a House can take RL months of dedicated effort to become passably familiar with, as per Delirium's example.  It's been declared not a high priority, however, so I doubt it'll change soon, I just love discussing possible ways to streamline and improve the game.  And the 'STATUS QUO' crowd really annoys me with their shortsightedness, or their thinly veiled join-date-based elitism, so I'm sorry for being fairly aggressive at first...  appeals to tradition just mean fuck all.

[Delirium]

When you roll up a new kadian family member, you're just starting out, anyway. You're not expected to be perfectly knowledgeable. I don't see the issue.

Learn along with your character.

You don't start playing the game knowing all the wilderness areas like the back of your hand, either.

C'mon man. Seriously.

p.s. I didn't keep that list. I'm aware I'm probably an exception to the rule; but no, I'd start out only vaguely remembering.

edit: I missed where you said "passable knowledge" - very sneaky. When I said extensive I meant extensive. I had "passable knowledge" of the Kadian inventory much sooner than that.

[Kronibas]

The only inconsistency that mildly bugs me is that some Houses have orderable item lists posted on the GDB for not only family members but also grunt level dudes while others do not have item lists for either, anywhere.

[Khorm]

Just to be totally clear: the idea behind this suggestion is not to provide lists to people so that they may order the awesomest shit in the universe, and it is not to replace the interaction between client PCs and merchanting PCs.

I only thought it would be nice for people playing merchant PCs to take an order from someone, walk to an npc, and place the order. This would be a replacement for logging into the request system and placing the order in that manner.

I can see some of the points against it, particularly when people are like "I want something orange to go with by hair" or something along those lines. I still believe this could be resolved via a question request, and it could be added to your PCs knowledge about product.

I just thought it would be nice to have a system in place that allows for complete consistency. This isn't to say that staff is doing a poor job of filling order requests.. I just believe it's a somewhat unnecessary step in the process.

[Feco]

While I do think it would be nice to have a simple, ingame ordering system, I'm going to just have to agree with what has been said by a few people.

I didn't find the system terribly difficult as a Salarri merchant, at least one staffer has said it's not an issue for them, and I'm not sure it's the best use of coders time.  I wouldn't oppose a system that was put into place, but I'm not gonna lobby for one to be coded.

[Eurynomos]

The only inconsistency that mildly bugs me is that some Houses have orderable item lists posted on the GDB for not only family members but also grunt level dudes while others do not have item lists for either, anywhere.

This inconsistency was rectified.